Justin Trosclair 0:02
Episode Two small town pharmacist big time grows. I’m your host, Dr. Justin trust Claire, and today you’re hearing Dr. Courtney Petris perspective

for doctors who want a thriving practice and abundant homeless. Listen as your host Dr. Justin Charles Claire goes behind the curtain and interviews doctors and guess about real world triumph struggles, practical tips and entertainment on this episode of

Unknown 0:29
a doctor’s perspective.

Justin Trosclair 0:32
Dr. Justin trust glare here, Episode Two, you can find all the show notes at a doctor’s perspective, net slash zero to the numbers based on the podcast that I listened to. There’s not a lot of female guests. And I have got one today Dr. Courtney Petri. She’s a farmer says she went to school in Tennessee. He’s had her own clinic our store for two years. She is crushing it there. Definitely listen to the end, where you find out about her favorite book app, how she got to meet her idol and what she does for relaxation. It’s a treat. Without further ado, let’s get into the interview.

Today we have Courtney Petri. Yep, that’s me, doctor and pharmacy. How are you today?

Unknown 1:15
I’m good. Little early, but I’m okay. I’m happy to be here. Appreciate you being here.

Justin Trosclair 1:21
Well, let’s just jump right into it. Okay, okay. What made you become a pharmacist versus any other type of Doctor?

Unknown 1:28
Well, I tell you what, I spent quite a few years kind of thinking it over. I liked medicine. I knew I wanted to do something with medicine, or at least science in sciences in some aspect and

Unknown 1:43
spent a couple years doing internships and different jobs throughout undergrad. And nothing ever really stuck. So and I just for some reason, pharmacy just didn’t creep into my head until I moved to Nashville, Tennessee after I finished my undergraduate degree in biology. So when I was in, at University of Louisiana, Lafayette, I was working on my undergraduate and biology and minor in Chemistry. I worked with chimpanzees, we did cognitive research, did wetlands research, we did quite a few different things, and nothing ever. It was all interesting, but nothing ever stuck my guess, you know,

Justin Trosclair 2:25
right?

Unknown 2:26
I finished my degree. And I was like, Okay, what do I do, I’m going to just move away and kind of get a fresh, fresh perspective, and

Unknown 2:36
just started working over there and happen to be in a grocery store and was like, hey, there’s a pharmacy. I never really never really thought about that. So let’s, let’s try that out. Right, check it off the list. Why not? So I went and applied and applied like as a cashier something and they were like, yes, please like anything, you know, because a lot of times are super understaffed. So, okay, I worked over the at like a little chain. It was a Kroger, which is kind of like Albertsons is down here. Yeah, there’s

Justin Trosclair 3:13
like Texas area.

Unknown 3:15
Yes. Exactly. Like Texas area. Exactly. So worked as a cashier. It was flu season, like flu shots. It was madness. And I loved it. Oh, my God. I mean, I just ate it up, I ate it up. I’d come home from work. And I’m like, sitting on the couch just exhausted. And I just had this huge smile on my face. And I thought, I found it, I found it. This is it. Like, no matter the insanity. I loved it. And it combined, what I enjoyed most and science and medically related. And it allowed me to work with the public and do lots of good things for people. So it kind of started a journey from there. And that was 10 years ago. So still working in retail new Yeah.

Justin Trosclair 3:59
Wow. Yeah. And there’s a lot of retail and pharmacy, it seems Yeah.

Unknown 4:04
Oh, there’s quite a bit. I mean, there’s, there’s, there’s a growing clinical aspect to it, which in pharmacy school, they really push the clinical aspect. And that’s great. I’m all about it. Because you know, you want to you want to be on the top of your game, when you ever you get out no matter what you’re working in. So in pharmacy school, you can specialize do like a post grad, basically a one year program, or you can do a two year specialty. And that would allow you to specialize in pretty much, oh, gosh, I don’t even know how many different things I mean, you can just do endocrinology, you know, you can go and do just internal medicine. I mean, there’s just so much that you can do, which is nice, really expands

Justin Trosclair 4:56
it teaches you the ins and outs of the special drugs for cancer for endocrinology,

Unknown 5:02
basically, it’s a residency is what it is. So just like in in medical school, where they pick their path, and then they do certain level, you know, so many years of residency associated with that path. Week, we can do the same thing. We don’t have to but if we want to work in a clinical, you know, hospital setting or do research or whatnot, you have to have that now.

Justin Trosclair 5:23
What makes

Unknown 5:24
Yeah, which is good. So probably in your, in your hospitals where you’re working. You’ve got a team of pharmacists, those guys and gals are all clinically, you know, have done their residence in order to even qualify to be there.

Unknown 5:37
Wow. Yep.

Justin Trosclair 5:39
Wow. So a retail store, big box chain type of place. They may or may not have that residency. Yeah. So you can not necessary right. So

Unknown 5:50
you can actually do a residency in community pharmacy. And I thought about it. Because I knew by the time I got to the end of pharmacy school, I was like, Okay, I mean, I knew exactly, I knew what I was going to do the first semester of pharmacy school, I knew I wanted to own an independent pharmacy. Yeah, so that that was quite nice to figure that out so quickly, but they do have one and two year residency with that. And I thought about it, and I really waited out. And I realized that, for me, it wasn’t it would be basically postponing my time to get to a pharmacy, you know? In other words, you know, what you want to do?

Unknown 6:30
Yeah,

Unknown 6:30
yeah. And it would take two years to go through that and more money, and you would get paid a little bit of money. Have you know, so it’s just, you have so much new grads are

Justin Trosclair 6:41
very underpaid for the amount of debt that we get out. Right?

Unknown 6:44
Right, you just know how much debt you already have. And you’re like, I gotta get, I just got to get out there. And I knew that once I got out there, I could start getting paid, start paying down my student loans, start saving money, which is huge to try to buy a pharmacist. It worked out I mean, and I talked, I’ve talked to quite a few people who have actually done them. And and I realized that basically my first two years

Unknown 7:13
leading up to and the first year of ownership, so the first year leading up to owning a pharmacy and the first year of owning a pharmacy basically, that’s it was a residency, because I didn’t make very much money, because all the money went into buying the store or owning the store. And

Justin Trosclair 7:33
and I learned a lot of work in the same. I’m sorry, yeah. Did you work in the same pharmacy that you ended up purchasing? Yes,

Unknown 7:39
right out of school. I so

Unknown 7:43
funny story, I, I started working initially at another pharmacy, they wanted to sell me their store and spent about eight and a half months there, and it just just wasn’t working out. I wasn’t happy there.

Unknown 8:00
With the the current management, and I knew that I would have to keep

Unknown 8:06
some of the well really, there was a certain if the keep some of this, some of this stuff, and I only wanted to keep like one of them.

Unknown 8:14
So there was some issues, and I just there was just a lot of things told me this wasn’t meant to be there. The location was an ideal. They wanted a lot of money, you know, just financially it wasn’t a smart by. So I said you know what, it’s just not worth it. I quit that job. And

Unknown 8:34
on a whim, a friend of mine suggested that, that I actually go in float, you know, like work at this other little mom and pop pharmacy and carnival. And they were just need like two days a week. And I mean, I was desperate. I just needed a job. I kind of exited out of the other store. I had saved my money knew I was going to quit because I was miserable. And right. Yeah, I just was like, Okay, I just need enough to pay my student loans until I can get back on my feet. And so the guy was like, I’ll give you two days a week I said, I’ll take it, whatever, whatever, I’ll take it in the fall off to go do ship somewhere else too. Great. But by, by my first day, by noon of my first day, he offered me four days a week. So it just fit everything just fit so well. So fast. It was just great. It was great. So

Unknown 9:29
I don’t even know what Okay, so Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead.

Justin Trosclair 9:32
That’s good. So Well, there’s several avenues we can go here. I want to ask you about staff, I want to ask you about a couple other things. So I’m gonna just go right back into it. Okay,

Unknown 9:42
great. So

Justin Trosclair 9:46
what? Do you have this a

private pharmacy now? Yep, you’ve got your own staff?

Unknown 9:53
Yep.

Justin Trosclair 9:55
What makes a good staff person? And how do you hire good stuff?

Unknown 9:59
That’s a great question. For me, I really look at character. We’re in a small, small town, and in a small town, you know, personal personality really matters. And having personal service really matters. You know, when you’re dealing with the geriatric population, who’s already very

Unknown 10:22
intimidated by the medical process, whether you know, go into the doctor’s office, a lot of times they go to the doctor’s office, and you know that, they kind of tell them a few things. And doc writes a script was like, Okay, here you go. And then they come to me. And it’s like, they don’t know, they have no clue what was written for them. They don’t know why it was written for them.

Unknown 10:43
It gives me an opportunity to sit down and talk with them and explain everything. So they, they really like that personal service. A, it’s our clinical duty and our professional duty to do things like this for patients. But it doesn’t work. It doesn’t happen a lot. Unfortunately,

Unknown 11:01
I really try to make a welcoming environment with my staff, I want my staff to make people feel comfortable. You know,

Unknown 11:09
I want people to come in and ask the questions that they’re not going to ask their physician, or or, you know, speak about something that maybe they’re just too embarrassed to speak about. And I mean, I have had, gosh, I’ve had some pretty interesting conversations. Even in the last month or two, I had a young kid come in, and he was like, Hey, can I talk to you? And I’m like, Oh, I know, this is, you know, when they’re when they’re not when they want to pull you aside and talk to you, you know, it’s probably not something minor. And it turned out he had just been diagnosed with HIV. And he wanted to be, yeah, he, he wanted to know, if I carried certain medications, which he said, I don’t, but I can get my hands on these. That’s not a problem. And, you know,

Unknown 11:57
and he was like, well, I just really want to make sure that I’m safe to come and get this here that, you know, people aren’t going to know my business will? Of course not, that’s what’s what hip was for. We would never, you know, we’re not going to tell all. Yeah, I mean, we’re in a town of 1500.

Unknown 12:16
Something like that is huge. If, you know, you start telling people’s business minutes, you know, so anyway, to answer your to fully answer your question, this ties into it, it’s just very important for to as this for your staff, to be able to be welcoming to your, to your, to your patients and be kind to them. We just want to create a really open and welcoming environment. So obviously, I look for people that have a good personality that are not afraid to talk to people, but we’ll talk to them respectfully and and are, you know, that know, what’s really important is that their local, I want them to know, the people in the town and the people in the town know them. Big that hope. Yeah, it helps with trust when I got there. I’m considered an out of town, you know, oh, you’re not from around here. And it’s like, well, I’m from 20 minutes away. 30 minutes away. I’m not, I’m not that far. But foreigner. But Tim Yeah, but to them, that was like a big deal for someone to come out. So it took me about almost a year to really, like earn the trust of the people. So and once once they once they did, or once I earned that trust, then it just opened the floodgates now people come to me for everything, you know, so which is great. But to have local people that know the people here, I feel like is really important. You want someone that as mature, you need maturity. This is a very high stress environment. We’re, we’re doing a lot of prescriptions every day, at least 200 prescriptions a day, which, you know, compared to these big box chains is not a lot for one pharmacist in a tech, a cashier that’s well now to text. that’s a that’s a lot. That’s a lot we’re hopping. So you have to be able to move you got to answer a question.

Unknown 14:10
Yeah, you have to be able to move Why don’t have to take this one seven drove away,

Unknown 14:13
right? You have to be able to move fast and Think fast and be mature about it and not be playing on your phone in the corner. You know, we don’t have time for that. So you know, you just really look for a good maturity in this environment.

Justin Trosclair 14:29
trainable

Unknown 14:29
trainable, very much all of my staff, all of my staff basically came in had never worked in a pharmacy before but wanted to and train them from the ground up. And now I mean, they they

Justin Trosclair 14:41
did you do that through like a company like help you? Are you just naturally gifted in these things?

Unknown 14:50
Neither

Unknown 14:52
didn’t bring in a company. I’m a cheapskate. If that’s the right term to use on the frugal, I’m financial fiscally responsible, let’s go with that. But now, I mean, we knew what we needed. We needed in, in in the pharmacy, we knew what kind of skills were needed, what needed to be taught. I knew what tasks there were to do each day. And I knew what was legally allowed to delegate to to my texts. But I had to get my text certified. Yeah, I had to get them all certified, which they have to they have to do 600 hours under me. And then they have to sit down for an examination. That’s actually pretty hard. I mean, not I looked at the book, and I thought, My God, this is, this is like a watered down version of pharmacy school for you know, somebody that has no education, literally, I mean, that high school education is all that’s necessary for it, you need to be able to do, you know, some fairly decent math and, and have a really good knowledge of the law system. In the state you have to have. You have to be able to do comp, there’s hospital stuff. I mean, it’s, it’s quite a, it’s quite a lengthy process. So we have some study manuals, just like we would prefer our licensure exams. Right, right. And I mean, we literally, I mean, I just literally went and taught the book to them and taught them the the various things, and it covered everything. So I’ve got two, well, now technically, for certified texts, two of them were already certified. They were grandfathered in, but two of them I certified. We got certified under me and then yeah, so. So what

Justin Trosclair 16:37
kind of two questions one is going to be?

What do pharmacist end up getting sued for? As a chiropractor, like, you know, sexual harassment? That’s a nice, good one to get sued for fraud. That’s a good one. But for pharmacy, I, you know, I’m not familiar with it, what kind of things y’all get sued for, and then another could maybe tie in is what are some misconceptions about your profession?

Unknown 16:59
Great questions. I think that and I mean, look, I haven’t been sued, knock on some form of wood, I hope that it never happens. I’ve got malpractice insurance, and you know, I’m fully prepared if something were to happen.

Unknown 17:13
Pretty much med errors. So if Yeah, wrongful, like a wrongful death suit or something like that, you know,

Justin Trosclair 17:21
milligram versus microgram? Well, yeah.

Unknown 17:23
Oh, yeah. Sure. There’s, there’s been a lot more Yeah. I mean, there was a heparin case, not with me. But in the US not, there was a major issue with heparin being missed toast in the hospital. And I mean, giving giving a pediatric child, the adult dose of heparin and the kid bleeding out, I mean, it’s just, there’s some, I mean, you can kill people, unfortunately, easier than you think with medication. So we have to be very careful which we are we have lots of checks, checks and balances, systems in the store. And I’d say med errors definitely the most often seen thing of giving them the wrong medication. You know, I mean, you’re filling. I right now, I’m averaging about 4300 prescriptions a month. You know,

Unknown 18:14
when you’re when you’ve got a small staff and that’s how many prescriptions you’re doing, your chance of error increases your you know, you’ve got employees and yourself I mean, you get exhausted and your you start to get mentally exhausted and things happen.

Justin Trosclair 18:30
So we have in the computer checks a lot of your there’s like checks and balances in the computer when you print it.

And all of that. Absolutely not. I follow you on Facebook. Yeah. Well, you’re actually on my fee, which I should say like that. Okay. Sounds like you’re crushing it this year. We’re crushing

Unknown 18:46
it will crush we.

Unknown 18:50
Yeah. Oh, God, I since I bought the store

Unknown 18:56
should we throw numbers out or no?

Justin Trosclair 18:58
percent?

Unknown 19:00
person with per cents will make it a real easy thing. Basically. Prescription volume wise have more than doubled the volume since I bought the store two years ago.

Unknown 19:14
dollar wise, I am.

Unknown 19:18
See almost doubled in sales since and that’s Wow, that’s impressive in a pharmacy that that’s a lot of money. That’s not like a we did an extra 10 prescriptions and made an extra thousand dollars. No, we’re talking like a million dollars. This

Justin Trosclair 19:33
is just description. We’re not talking

supplements or shoe inserts or whatever else Coca Cola or you

Unknown 19:41
know, just prescriptions, like a mill a million dollars more in sales than two years ago. And that I mean, obviously that’s nonprofit, but, you know, it’s a beautiful thing. It’s a beautiful thing to have grown that much that fast. In such a small town. That’s great.

Justin Trosclair 20:00
Exactly. I mean, 1500 people? Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, about challenge,

Unknown 20:04
we service a lot of the outlying areas as well. So I say 1500 people, but you know, we’re looking at, like Leon, Bill, Port Barry, all these little small towns that are very

Unknown 20:17
far but near at the same time, because they’re just all little country towns and a lot of income. So the only doctor in Oroville in his nurse practitioner or next door to me,

Justin Trosclair 20:27
the Wow,

Unknown 20:28
yeah. Oh, yeah, I knew what I was doing. There, they’re waiting room opens into mine, we have a door aside door, and they can literally just leave the doctor’s office and walk right in. Oh, come on, that’s gonna be Yeah, and so why not come and see me, because we’re very nice, you know, we’re going to, we have a very good reputation in the town of working with people financially. So you know, the job market is not great. Right now with oil. We’ve had a lot of issues, a lot of people have lost their jobs around here, or, or health insurance. A lot of people have lost their health insurance, they can’t afford it or whatnot. So they know that they can come to me, and that I’m going to be very fair with them on the price of their medication, you know, you may go to a big box chain, which I won’t name, right? They might have like a $4 list or like a cheap prescription list. But then you go bring them a medication that’s not on that list, and they might charge you $200. But that medication may only cost $4 as well. But they that’s how they make up their money. By Yeah, so I get a lot. So what do you do? Sorry, go ahead.

Justin Trosclair 21:38
I’m sorry. So you you make the price a little bit more manageable? Absolutely. Across the,

Unknown 21:44
across the board, I you know, usually I tack on either a certain percentage or a certain dollar amount. And honestly, if if I know the patient can afford it, I’m going to make that dollar amount affordable for them. I may not make a lot of profit, but the thing is, is sometimes in business is not about or at least for me and pharmaceutical or in pharmacy business. It’s not about the money, it’s about getting the proper medication in the patient’s hands, because otherwise, they’re not going to take it and they need the medication. You know,

Unknown 22:16
and they could, they could turn on that bait what they have.

Unknown 22:20
I mean, you look at somebody that comes out of the hospital, say for instance, that had a heart attack, okay. And standard protocols, put them on a beta blocker and car VEDA law or the sober law, there’s, you know, MOTOBLUR law, there’s these different different drugs, they would put them on. Because there’s been evidence, evidence based medicine to show Look, this is going to work. This has shown all, you know, reduction and all cause mortality. I mean, you know, these are important things. So standard protocol is you get the patient out of there, get them stabilized, you’re going to start them on a beta blocker, you’re going to you know, get them on an aspirin regimen, you’re going to follow up with a cardiologist, etc, etc. Well, they might come to me and say, Well, I went to such and such store to get my prescription for, I don’t know, let’s just say I’ve had a big problem with Daya van lately, which is not a beta blocker, but we’re going to use that for an example. There’s a generic for it. And I think that drug might cost maybe $6, for 100 of them, you know, in other words, it’s a cheap drug, right? Really Am I go to a big box chain and the big box chain treasures, heart charged them $200 for that same medication. And so they’ll call the doctor and say, I can’t afford this. I’m not taking it. So you, you better figure something out. So then I start getting phone calls. And now I’ve kind of gotten to the point where I have such a reputation in town that people just know, to come to me that they can call me, I have kind of this policy of I don’t care where you get your prescription filled. If you want to know how much something is going to cost? And you want an honest answer, you come and talk to me. If even if you don’t feel with me, I’d at least like to help you get it to where you know, it’s manageable and know that you’re not getting, you know, screwed over.

Justin Trosclair 24:08
I mean, I’ve seen that so often, even in my own profession where people they don’t know better. It’s like, you don’t have to buy these outrageous care opinion. Yeah. When you could, you know, are like, Oh, you can we don’t know what the fee is going to be until you come and we build it. And then insurance lets us know like, That’s not true. Yeah, you know, goodwill, you’re going to get $27 and 54 cents, with this one insurance company. Did you do it? 50 times a week. Right? You know?

Unknown 24:32
Yeah, exactly. I mean, we we have so many insurance, we have hundreds and hundreds, there’s, there’s no way for me to be able to go, Oh, I know exactly what that formulary is going to do. Because in pharmacy, the formulary changes all the time. So something that may have cost a $10 copay. The next month may jump up to $50. And then the patient doesn’t. They’re like why insurance does I mean, they dictate it and a lot of times they will send something to the patient, but the patient doesn’t realize it. They don’t read it. We don’t read that. Now. I don’t read that mean, I don’t read it either. So I can’t say anything. You know, I can’t be judgmental about it. So but then they come in, they’re freaking out. It’s like, Well, I mean, this is what’s happening. So

Justin Trosclair 25:18
well, I got a question for you. You’re talking about relationships with the doctor next door, building relationships in the community? What has been your top two or three marketing tactics? That’s brought you the most return on investment? and consistently? a? I’m assuming it’s not Facebook ads?

Unknown 25:35
No. Oh, my goodness. And people keep contacting me, oh, well, you put an ad in this or a radio ad? Or let’s do a billboard. And I’m like, I don’t need to do. I mean, it’s not yours? No, I know. I know. Right?

Justin Trosclair 25:50
Maybe in a small town, but right.

Unknown 25:52
But I you know, honestly, I don’t need to do any advertising. I At first I thought oh, yeah, I need to do a lot of advertising. Word of mouth was my biggest advertisement in town, just by being working. I mean, working really hard to put a good reputation out there. But my biggest return on investment kind of ties into that. And it’s literally just working my tail off and working for the people and kind of going out and going, you know, talking to people and saying look like I promise you, we’re going to take care of you. You can trust me. And that’s been my book. My most joyful thing is people coming in and saying, I don’t know you, but I trust you. Because of a B and C like you did this for my grandmother, you did this for my friend. So my biggest return on investment has been that just I mean, honestly, sweat equity, sweat equity,

Justin Trosclair 26:46
everyone’s dream those referrals like absolutely What? How what’s the typical shift for you? 12 hours in a day, six hours in

Unknown 26:54
a day? Oh, God, I wish it was six. Hmm.

Unknown 26:58
Well, I’m the only

Unknown 27:00
Oh, that would be nice. No, honestly, I’ve got it’s gotten a lot better. I will tell you, when I first started out, I would get to the store for 6am. And I would usually leave close to 9pm. So yeah, was a 15 hour day. Those words what happens when you started? Yeah, those are typical for the first probably a year. And then I just got to a point where mentally It was like, I can’t keep this up. I mean, and it was, you know, five days a week. And by the time I hit the weekend, I was just done. I mean, stick a fork in me, I am done. And I would just lay there in bed, like oh my god, you know, it just it wore me down. And you know, when you get out of graduate school program like yours, and like mine, I mean, you’re just used to that, that grind that like, Okay, let’s do this go hard for you know, at least 12 hours a day. And so they warned us when we graduated, they said, Just a heads up when you finish school, you’re going to try to work like 10 million hours a week, because that’s what you’re used to be careful. You know, you don’t have to, it’ll be okay. Like, you know, and I was like, Oh, no, I’m going to want to do things. And then you just get so caught up in it. Like, oh, gosh, I need so

Justin Trosclair 28:15
much to do.

Unknown 28:16
Yeah, it never ends. It never ends. But as the years have progressed,

Unknown 28:24
I’ve cut my hours down to about 65 to 70 a week. I’ve really, except for in the winter months. It’s just you can forget it. I mean, I getting out early is just not something that’s happening right now. It has cough and cold season flu season. People make their dinner Oh yeah, people meet their deductibles. And so they like panic in November and December. And they’re like, Hey, you remember those five creams that you filled for me back in February, go ahead and fill all of those and you know, anything else, you see that I need filling like any of my meds and I’m like, oh my god. So sometimes you it’s like, okay, there’s 20 medications for a person, you know, whether it’s, you know, some kind of little cream that they use for eczema, but they only use it every once in a while, you know, they’ve met their deductible, and they’re like, go ahead and fill that for me. You know, I’d like to hold on to that, you know, it’s like, Okay,

Justin Trosclair 29:19
sounds like a good Christmas gift.

Unknown 29:21
And exhausting one, I made the mistake of last year going on vacation Around this time, thinking that that would be smart. Never again, I was at the store till midnight, like every night just trying to catch up on work so that I could go on vacation. I’m like, I’m never doing that again. So I go in September now. I made smart, smart decisions.

Unknown 29:43
Okay, yeah.

Justin Trosclair 29:45
So let’s switch gears just a little bit here.

We kind of mentioned it earlier. You were just kind of out of school at this point. What would you recommend students at this time? Doing your profession is any advice that you could give them? Looking back so far?

Unknown 30:04
Well, I mean, it depends on what they want to do. If you want I can give you I’ll give you two answers will go with like a general answer.

Unknown 30:14
So if you’re coming out of school, pharmacy school, and you know you’re going to work, you know, at a big box chain, or wherever, or a mom and pop, you’re not going to own a pharmacy, but you’re going to go work somewhere, I really suggest not getting caught up in the idea of Hey, I’m making money, let’s go buy things. They really hammered on us in pharmacy school, at the very end about making smart financial decisions. I mean, I came out of school with $240,000 in debt for just graduate school, undergrad was about 6%, 7%,

Unknown 30:53
six and a half to eight and a half percent varying a lot. Yeah, that’s a big monthly payment. Super fun. So people, people would kind of come out of school and go, Oh my gosh, I’m making 100 grand a year, whatever. Let’s go buy a $400,000 house and buy a BMW and buy this. And it’s like, put on the brakes, buddy, because those those student one paycheck

Justin Trosclair 31:17
away

Unknown 31:18
from failure. Yeah, you’re exactly like you need to pay those student loans down.

Unknown 31:23
And so the same applies with if you’re going to own a pharmacy, pay your student loans down, but also save for a down payment on the store, I had to put up $30,000 on top of my store loan, like that was part of the deal, I didn’t have any collateral. Coming into it, I had really good credit, great credit history never missed a payment on anything. But I had so much student loan that they were just like, um, you know, you don’t really have any collateral. So we’re going to need you to put up like, $30,000 towards the, you know, so forth, right, $400,000 loan, and so I had to put up, you know, 30 grand on, you know, in addition to that, to show that, like, Hey, I’m not just kind of messing around like, so, you know, save your money and not a school that would be hard to do. It’s impossible. I actually, you know, I’ll be honest, I ended up having to borrow some money from my dad, which I’ve almost since paid all back, but because, like my lawyer cost $10,000 to get that. Yeah, for the the purchase agreement, the transaction. I mean, it was a 70 page document, to buy the store. And it

Justin Trosclair 32:36
oh my goodness,

Unknown 32:36
it truly requires $10,000 worth the legal fees. It’s worth it. Because when you’re buying someone else’s business, you need to make sure that you’re covering yourself, because what if they, you know, made some poor decisions and the DEA comes down? You know, you have to protect yourself? Absolutely, because you’re taking over their patient files. So, anyway, yeah, that’s my biggest thing is pay down debt, save money. I live in a small little apartment house type deal, and it cost me $400 a month. And I have I still live there. I’ve been there. You know, you’re making people really upset right now. 400 400

Unknown 33:15
a month?

Unknown 33:16
Yeah, it was a steal. Look, I did that on purpose. I mean, I whatever I could get for as cheap as possible. It’s, you know, it’s kind of cramped, but hey, it works. It works. Well, I’m

Justin Trosclair 33:26
loving this, this mindset, because I’m right up there with you. And, you know, buying the clinic and going through the loan process myself, it was those student loans. They hurt you. And the banks Look at that. And they’re just like, yeah, we’re not going to give nothing good luck out there. Yeah,

Unknown 33:42
I and I ended up having to go through Yeah, I had to go through a bank that actually has a pharmacy department. So they kind of knew what they were dealing with. And I really lucked out because they were associated with the wholesale that I was also buying from so kind of, I don’t want to say use connections, but basically, I sought out all resources, because the banks, the local banks looked at me and they just laughed, they were like, there’s no right way that we’re going to give you you know, 400 grand to buy a pharmacy, you know, it ain’t happening, but then really no experience either been in the business 00 you know, but um, you know, the pharmacy department that I dealt with, with this bank, and it’s a bank out of like, Arkansas or something.

Unknown 34:26
I had to sit down and show them numbers. I wasn’t just like, Hey, give me money. You know, I had to show that the store was profitable, and had had the ability to make money. And I had to show basically how much I grew up in the short time that I had already been there. So I mean, it you know, wasn’t easy, but yeah, they approve me and I’m cool. Thank God, that’s I’m so grateful. That’s a

Justin Trosclair 34:47
very valuable resource. Because whether you’re optometrist, pharmacists, chiropractor, if you have those avenues, reach out and grab it. Yeah. I mean, I know, that’s what they’re there for. I’m

Unknown 34:58
sure. Do you? How’s it working car practice care? If you’re trying to buy is there? Like, I know when in medicine, like in medical school?

Justin Trosclair 35:07
They’ll we do not have anything? You don’t have anything good? Yeah. I

mean, we were kind of like the black sheep of the profession where we are, you know, you can get out of school, like, Oh, you want a $300,000? loan? Here we go. But for us, no way. Yeah. You know, you gotta you gotta knock on doors are going to be creative sometimes. And, yeah, that’s what I did at the beginning, creative and take my time. And then once you get an established, like you said, six months a year, then you can start knocking on the banks again, and say, Hey, can you buy out this higher loan or whatever you got to do? Yeah,

Unknown 35:38
I’m going through that right now with my student loans. I’m trying to refinance them, and I keep getting turned down. And it’s like, I don’t understand what’s going on. Like, I haven’t really good credit. I own I have collateral now I own, you know, very profitable pharmacy. It’s just that, you know, what did it’s going to take two years of business taxes before they take me seriously, and realize that I’m like, I’m, I’m not just playing around, you know, so it’s no big deal. But

Justin Trosclair 36:05
yeah, maybe they just like all your interest.

Unknown 36:07
I don’t want to give that away. Oh,

Unknown 36:08
yeah. Well, I won’t make any comments on that.

Justin Trosclair 36:15
All right. Well, let’s, let’s continue here, let’s see.

Five Year goals. 10 year goals. What have you set for yourself? How do you determine if it’s worthy of your pursuit? Yeah,

Unknown 36:26
that’s a great question. I actually had, like, in my fourth year of school, I had a professor that was really big on one year, five year and 10 year plans. And he was like, write this down. So I set some I actually have them stored in my phone. But

Unknown 36:44
they kind of got all jumbled up. Because my my five, I guess it was my five year plan at the time was to own a pharmacy. And that happened in one year. So whoops.

Justin Trosclair 36:57
How dare you not shoot for them? I know, the soldiers

Unknown 37:00
look totally sold myself short. So Wow. Yeah. So I want I actually, and I don’t know if this will ever happen. But it could, it could, that’s why it’s going to stay in my little five year plan or 10 year plan. I’d like to get certified as a diabetes educator.

Unknown 37:20
You would have to do, it’s only on the rise. Yeah, I know, I know, especially if you were really especially where I live. But in order to do that, you need 1000 hours of seeing patients basically, I got to do some of this when I was in my fourth year of school, one of my clinical rotations for a month is I worked in a diabetes clinic and literally or it was an internal med clinic. And literally me and or it was one of my professors is a certified diabetes educator. And so I worked with him and we got to see patients and I was like, Man, this is awesome. Basically, I would have a collaborative practice agreement with a physician, and I could see their diabetic patients, I can help make med adjustments, insulin adjustments, and get paid for it, you know, you can build this.

Unknown 38:12
That’s kind of a without having to do these

Unknown 38:16
postgrad residencies, this is a close way for me to be able to do something I enjoy like that, because I weird, but I love diabetes, I think it’s so interesting and useful. I mean, there’s so much, so much need to have an education in that and to be able to work with people now. So that’s a big goal for me, I have not made any steps towards that goal. Because I’ve been building a business for the last two years, but I’m hoping

Justin Trosclair 38:47
it’s on your radar, it’s

Unknown 38:48
on my radar. So my my one year plan is to be able to say is, this is Yeah, this is a good plan, my one year plan is actually be able to take more time off of work, you know, kind of make that transition and try to bring a pharmacist and more often to help me just so I don’t get burned out.

Unknown 39:07
And that’s been a little bit of an issue. My accountants kind of like, well, we’re not really there yet. You know, like, Oh, can we be there? Like, what do I need to do? Like, I’m filling so many prescriptions, so much more than then I was like, what else do I need to do to make this happen? I just want a little time off. So I’m making it happen? I

Justin Trosclair 39:27
do have a question on that. Yeah, you have the opportunity. You know, we look at the big box, they’re pretty much they sell everything from cereal to anything Do you have that is that a revenue stream that you could build to make more money somehow,

Unknown 39:43
there’s not a profit in that, honestly, the like, I know, like the big box chains, these ones that have these huge front ends at so you know, toys and, you know, cigarettes, cigarettes, and candy and all kinds of stuff like that the Prophet margin on it is actually not that great. And now mind you, I mean, I still I have a pretty large over the counter product section, or at least compared to what it was. And I try, I’ve got it’s hard for me because my competition is like, you’re like dollar stores, you know, your family dollar, you know, the these kind of like, places where obviously if people want to fix income, it’s understandable. They’re going to they got it, they have to do what they have to do. So I have to try to compete with that. So I had an issue recently where my wholesale

Unknown 40:37
change the pricing on all of my PCs, and I mean, not just as a little bit, it was like something that might have cost $2 and 50 cents suddenly was $6. And I know that doesn’t sound like much. But I mean, my goodness, if you are on a fixed income, and you can barely afford the $2 and 50 cent, you’re not going to buy the $6. You know, so I mean, I call them that’s why I’m by the brand new. Yeah,

Unknown 41:01
I mean, I mean that the store

Unknown 41:03
exactly the

Unknown 41:04
same thing. Exactly. So I mean, I called I called him and I was like, No, you have to stop all of this. So I had to go through every single item in the store. And he sent me a list of all the items and basically cross out the new price right in the old price and send it back to him. And he had to change everything I said, I don’t think you understand, like I’m competing. I’m in an environment where people don’t have a lot of money, and I’m competing with dollar stores and whatnot, and they’re going to go to the dollars, they will drive across town to the dollar store before spinning. I mean, that’s too much money, you know? Yeah, I mean, the over the counters, I and I always tell people, if there’s something you need, I will order it and I will keep it on the shelf for you. So I have a very personalized over the counter section.

Unknown 41:53
So people come to me and they say, Well, I like this product. And I’m like, I’ve never even heard of that. But if I can get it and they’re going to buy it. I’m getting it, you know, and obviously, as long as it’s not something that I know, you know, a lady called me for some St. John’s wort the other day and I was like, come on not happening, highly, highly. Some huge issues with drug interactions. It’s a huge sip inducer cider, Chrome p 50. So basically, it

Unknown 42:22
increases the metabolism of every drug you could possibly take, like, you know, so yeah, so you take it for mood and depression, and then it basically wipes out all the other medications you’re taking and make some useless. So

Justin Trosclair 42:37
I have a really good piece of information today.

Unknown 42:39
Yeah. Oh, yeah, there’s a you know, you have to be really careful with these some of these over the counter products. So or natural products, you know, just about drug interactions. I’m bio, by all means not against natural meds. I think there’s some great, great purpose to them. You just have to watch drug interactions. So yeah, yesterday I had a patient. Well, it was the mom, the baby has the flu. And you can tell that she was hesitant about getting the Tamiflu because a lot of people complain about it. Frankly, the studies show that it doesn’t even really help you that much like as much as they thought. So most doctors discouraged against it anyway. And it was a $75 copay. And this lady, she’s got money, this lady’s got money, so it didn’t matter for her. But you could just sense it. And so she kind of asked me some questions. And I was like, Look, I’m gonna be honest with you. You know? It How long is the baby been sick? Oh, two days? The babies and and what are the symptoms like is you know, and she was like, well, the kid is a two year old. And she’s really doesn’t even exhibit any symptoms. They just happened to find that out whenever they were doing some other tests. And I was like, Look, you can get it. I said, but honestly, if you just increase fluid intake and an alternate, some Tylenol and ibuprofen for treatment, and that’s about all you can really do with the flu. I mean, there’s just not much you can do Tamiflu doesn’t really work. And you know,

Justin Trosclair 44:09
it hasn’t let me get sick. It’s just managing your symptoms, your body’s still having to like, I’m going to take 10 days if you want to cough go for it if you don’t want to call if you can take something

Unknown 44:21
right and i don’t like antibiotics have their purpose in life, but they are so over prescribed that and I’m really against that so I really try to push people have like, okay, no, you you don’t need that, you know, Deepak you probably just need to get some you know, Robo testing or whatever uncomfortable for a little while. Yeah, you’re gonna it’s gonna feel like for a little bit, but

Justin Trosclair 44:45
I haven’t taken you always like, rah rah and about, but I’m not that guy. So it’s kind of fun to have you on. But

it

was just hard. Yeah. Glad to hear that you’re not you know, I’m guessing there’s people that are just whatever the doctor says, I’ll write the script and make money. But that’s talk to them and understand and just, you know, I like that. Oh,

Unknown 45:04
yeah. And I yeah, and I mean, I’ve gotten the doctor on board next door of that too. And just kind of like Look man, like 99% of this is viral. Don’t write a script for this. Like you’re older. Just don’t you know? Like when you need it. Oh, yeah, well, you that’s why we we have so much resistance issues now. Now they’re having to write Tuesday packs, whereas it used to be just one and everything was fine. Now you have to like double the dose, take it for twice as long because of the resistance issues. So man sucks.

Justin Trosclair 45:34
Anyway. Now, as a chiropractor, we’re always like supplements, rah rah, rah? Is there a way mean that you went to school for this? To determine what’s a good supplement? And what are you looking for in something like that? If someone’s trying not to get on all the settings and all that What are you looking forward to you? Are you familiar with any of them? Yeah,

Unknown 45:54
I mean, well, if they want if they want to not get on a Staten, they can take read the story rice, but I will tell you that it’s basically a stat and an over the counter version of a stat and so you have just as much likelihood of having like the cramping issues. Haha, the we’ve had a lot of research lately that showed if you take co q 10 enzyme, along with your status, that it will actually reduce the cramping because what’s happening is the status are reducing your co q 10 ends on in your body. So by replacing it, we’re preventing some of the side effects with that. So a lot of times that’s helped people but co q 10 is a little bit expensive. So you know, you kind of find find that happy medium for people.

Justin Trosclair 46:43
What and price doesn’t always mean good either. Exactly is what I’m finding out like you there’s marketing My goodness, I

Unknown 46:50
have the biggest problem with with the OTC is where these like super, you know, combination, like cold flu sinus and whatever treatment and somebody brings it to you, you’re like, Okay, but what are your symptoms, and they tell you and you’re just like, you don’t need 80% of the medications in this pill. All you need is, you know, X, Y and Z, which is, you know, $2 versus this $15 box of whatever it is. I have a huge problem with that, that like repurposing of over the counter drugs to where people think it’s like, oh, great example. There’s a particular drugs, I won’t name it, but you probably figure it out. And it’s marketed for insomnia over the counter. And it’s got a catchy little, you know, little commercial and catchy little idea, like, Oh, it’s some, like has some Z’s on it or something because it’s, it’s going to help you go to sleep. If you look at the back of it, it’s been a drill, it is bloody been a drill, and they sell it for you know, like $8 for you know, 20 tablets and and people bring and I’m like, No, I’m not even going to order it. Because if someone comes to me and is asking for that, then I just bring them to the Benadryl to the Brent Benadryl section and explain that to them. And I’ll show them you know, active ingredients. But people get I don’t want to say duped a lot. But basically, I mean people get MySpace bamboozled? Absolutely they get misled lot and they think oh, well that’s a $10 box a medication. It’s got to work better. And it’s no it’s just repurposed.

Justin Trosclair 48:28
I remember my niece’s were young love the play was Christmas time I came in. Took I needed a Benadryl, but I wanted something non drowsy. Well, definitely didn’t get the non drowsy kind

Unknown 48:41
there’s there’s no such thing. I don’t think there’s such a thing as non drowsy Benadryl. They may market something but don’t fall for it. Yeah,

Unknown 48:49
definitely took the wrong thing. I was sorry, girl.

Unknown 48:53
Yeah. Geez. Poor things. Geez.

Justin Trosclair 48:55
Yeah. What can you do? Yep. We are completely switching gears. Let’s do one more people personal side. Oh, boy. I mentioned earlier during my feed, so I know. You have taken some vacation. He made me. Tell. Tell us. Yes. How do you take vacation? And how do you take more? What’s the secret? Is I work 60 hours a week? Oh, God,

Unknown 49:16
well, I have no secret. Because I am. So I am still trying to figure out how to take more. Honestly, like I actually the Dean of the pharmacy school I graduated from I am in the in the middle of sending her an email asking that very question of what what is enough vacation, what is considered appropriate in our profession, especially as an I’ll probably reach out to some pharmacy owners about the same thing because I’m, I’m in a struggle of, because, you know, it’s just me and there. And it’s an exhausting job. It’s a, so such a rewarding job. But I don’t get to eat lunch, don’t get a lunch break. I don’t even get to finish a cup of coffee half the time I don’t get to go to the bathroom. You know, it’s very, you know, it’s, I don’t know, the you see these things sometimes where people are like, Oh, this is what it’s like to work in an emergency room. And and like, I have friends that do, you know, do these things. I get it. Like I told I totally get what they’re going through because they never get a break either. And it’s it’s emotionally and mentally exhausting. It’s a wonderful thing, but it is and it’s hard on my body, you know, finding that I hate to use the word balance, but finding I guess that balance of Okay, like, I need to take some time. And for me, it’s not just like having a day off to go run errands, that that would be nice to I need to like step away because I have this problem of, I guess because we’re so personal with people. I have people that will try to get my cell phone number or will contact me through the internet somehow. Maybe Facebook or whatnot. And just they’re like, Well, I know you’re really busy but and like they need that you know, they people just I can’t separate from the store is basically what I’m saying. It’s very hard. I have to leave to do it. Which is why I go fishing a lot. Because Okay, fishing. Yeah. So fishing is kind of my cheaper way of a vacation. Because then I can go away for a couple hours and no one knows me out there. No one is going to stop me in the grocery store and asked me to fill their medication, which is why also were you fishing for brother. Oh, like speckled trout redfish, flounder. It’s all salt water fishing. Okay, yeah, so I go the Gulf. Yeah, I go to Grand shinier. Do you know where that said?

Justin Trosclair 51:46
I’m guessing South Louisiana.

Unknown 51:48
Oh, yeah. south south. It’s almost not in Louisiana. It’s

Unknown 51:52
the Gulf of Mexico straight up. But I have a kayak and I’ll go kayak fishing. That was kayak fishing. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don’t have a big boat. I just have, you know, but to me, it’s nice. It’s quiet. I can just clear my head and no one’s bothering me. No one’s you know, asking me for anything or asking for money or whatever. Right? As far as Yeah, the vacation thing. I made a promise to myself. That was one thing that I do spend money on. I don’t do material items. So I’m not you know, like, I’m not buying? I don’t know,

Justin Trosclair 52:26
for made from the same cloth. Yeah,

Unknown 52:28
I’m not buying like Versace purses. Or, you know, see a lot of people enjoy it. And you know what, that to each his own if that’s what they enjoy, spend their money on? Great. me. I like I like to travel. And I like to fish. So I saved my money for traveling. I use frequent flyer miles to get me. I mean, I’ve got almost $4,000 in frequent flyer miles right now that’s built up. Yeah, from where’d you go? This year, I went to France and Amsterdam, so well, and mostly Amsterdam, went to Normandy, which was beautiful. I just, I just like getting on it. And I mean, I’m sure you guys get to do a bit of that to where you’re at, you know, just getting on a train or a short flight in Europe, or where you’re at is probably not nearly as expensive as it is in the States. You know,

Justin Trosclair 53:18
she’s referring to China, but yeah,

Unknown 53:20
sorry.

Unknown 53:22
But you know, like in the States, you want to you want to hop on a plane and go somewhere, you’re going to drop five $600 for a flight. If you get to Europe, you get on a train. I took a train from Amsterdam to Paris for $42.

Justin Trosclair 53:36
Yeah. So cheap. $12 to travel. Yeah, 15 hours on a train. Right.

Unknown 53:41
So I mean, I do as much as that as I can. So I usually try to get one trip to somewhere in Europe a year. And then. So next year, I’m looking at possibly Switzerland and Prague. I don’t know, I’ve heard good

Justin Trosclair 53:57
thing. Really,

Unknown 53:58
I want to see as much for all Yeah, I want to see as much of the world as I can. You know, I’m fairly young, I don’t have I’m not, you know, don’t have kids yet. I’m not married. And so it’s like, Okay, I know that once these things do happen, I may not be able to do this to this extent. So let me just go crazy and do as much as I can now. So to do more of it, I don’t know, we’re working on that. That’s To be continued. But finding that balance of, of not spending enough time in the store and spending too much at the time of the store is my continual?

Justin Trosclair 54:34
Yeah. You’re not alone. Now, you didn’t mention I like that idea of putting someone in there. I thought about doing that when I was in full time clinic by myself. But we weren’t so busy. Where was really financially feasible. But that’s so smart. You put a slide in there for two days. Now you got a four day weekend. Yeah, you can go a lot of places in America for four days. And really just,

Unknown 54:55
and that’s absolutely some Mardi Gras this year. That’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m, I’m I’m going to have somebody work the Friday and the Monday and we’re off the Tuesday we’re closed. So I’m going to fly to Tennessee to where I went to pharmacy school and visit some of my friends for you know, couple of days, and I you know, got a couch to crush on. And all I needed was a flight basically. So yeah, I hired somebody for two days, and I get five days off, basically.

Justin Trosclair 55:23
Wow,

Unknown 55:24
you have to be very creative. And you have to be willing to take vacations. When most people don’t take like, you know, it’s not like, hey, it’s June, let’s go to the beach. like everybody’s doing that. So I have to, you know, take a vacation in September, or kind of an odd life for Yo, yeah, I’ve done that mandatory

Justin Trosclair 55:41
holidays are like, Okay, I’m gonna take it three or four day now. Yeah,

Unknown 55:44
I did that. I flew out on July 4, and came back that Sunday, Friday through Sunday, and I went to Missouri. I mean, you do what you have to do. It doesn’t matter if you only get one full day off. It’s better than nothing. So what do

Justin Trosclair 55:58
you gotta live for you? Doesn’t matter if Yeah, Bob down the street doesn’t approve of what you’re doing, if you like it, and that you’re winning. Yeah. That’s all look at it. Yep.

Unknown 56:07
Absolutely.

Justin Trosclair 56:09
So besides traveling and working, what preoccupies your mind Besides, you know, besides that? any hobbies? volunteering, anything like that? Yeah, I’m fishing. You say? Yeah,

Unknown 56:20
fishing, definitely. I collect I collect, collect a lot of things. I’m in a big antique collector. I guess not.

Unknown 56:29
Mostly, most of my antiques were actually given to me. Just people you know, antique What? Lots of things

Justin Trosclair 56:37
like spoons are some

Unknown 56:38
No. Medicine bottles, pharmacy stuff. I have a pretty large collection at work now that I’ve collected for about the last 10 years. Just old, old things people were will call me and say, I found this in my grandpa’s attic, and I was gonna throw it out. But uh, you know, thought about you? I knew you collected that stuff. And here you can have it. Somebody did that. And it was a it was a bottle of insulin from 1934.

Unknown 57:07
Was it 3424? I think it was 34 apologize. It’s kind of early on my brains not quite working yet. But uh, anyway, it was one of the first mass produced bottles of insulin, like two years after it was a pattern. Yeah, I was like, This is gold. And they they were going to throw it in the trash. You know, just stuff like that. What else you gonna do with that? Exactly. So do that. And Music is my other thing. I collect vinyl 70, eights wax cylinders. I’m Uh, I’m really into that. Another thing, john? country and bluegrass music. Because that’s that, yeah, I so I worked. How’d you get into bluegrass? Oh, that’s a funny story, probably for another podcast, but it was, uh, let’s go with stress management.

Unknown 57:56
And I was encouraged by someone to go to Bluegrass Festival, because they knew that I liked you know, kind of was getting into that type of music. And then I was hooked. I mean, that was it. Was it. So that was, that was 10 years ago.

Unknown 58:12
And I started doing a radio show 10 years ago as well, a bluegrass radio show. So what can call that a hobby? That it’s fun, but it’s a big? It’s a big hobby. Yes. It’s a little harder doing it. Yeah. Still doing it. It’s 10 years. Yeah, it’s, it’s hard because it takes me a while to to do it every every week. It’s a one hour show. But it probably takes me. I don’t know, I’ve got it fine to now to about six to 10 hours to do that one hour show. And I can do it in pieces, thank goodness. But it’s getting hard. I mean, when you work this much, you’re just like, the last thing you want to do is go home and do that. But I still enjoy it enough to keep doing it.

Justin Trosclair 58:54
That gives me more respect for these hour long podcast music. Yeah, podcast that I listened to it work. I’m like, wow, that takes that long to do. Yeah,

Unknown 59:02
well, I mean, come you don’t want to just throw random songs together you want it’s it’s art. I’m not an artist by any means. But it is a form of art, you know, piecing together stuff and making sure things sound properly and flow properly. And I don’t know, I don’t know. It is you play? I’m not really I own a mandolin and I never play it. So there you go. Okay,

Justin Trosclair 59:24
yeah, there we go. Do you have a morning, or lunch routine that grounds you or excite you for the rest of the day? Whichever way you kind of need?

Unknown 59:34
Yeah, I’m definitely not a lunch routine, because I don’t have lunch.

Unknown 59:39
But morning routine. I lately, I’ve really got it I have about a 25 minute drive to work. And I like that I purposely for many reasons live about 2530. You know, I live in Breaux bridge, which is you know, like I said, 2530 minute drive. And I really liked that on the way to work all either, you know, listen to some music, or lately, I’ve kind of gotten into listening to audiobooks. I really, I really enjoy that I you know, as I get older, I enjoy that more and more. Sounded like an old lady here, but

Justin Trosclair 1:00:13
you don’t have time to read. Just listen to it. And you get the same

Unknown 1:00:16
really, I don’t have any, I have a stack of books on my on my shelf here. And I don’t have time to read any of them. So I’m like, I wonder if there’s an audio book of this? Because I’m more likely to finish I can get the clue to these. Yeah, yeah. So that that’s been kind of lately and, and I do the same on the way home, which is nice. It helps me unwind. And kind of decompress and separate. You know, I kind of feel myself separating from the store at the closer I get to Breaux bridge from you know, from our Neville, you know, allows me to separate. So yeah, that that kind of stuff. I mean, listening to music, sometimes I’ll put on you know, like some just kind of jam out to some music to get fired up for the day, and just whatever the mood sets for.

Justin Trosclair 1:01:01
I mean, the stuff I listened to sometimes they’re like, meditation and this and that. I’m like, man, I don’t. I’m not into that yet. Maybe I’m just I haven’t arrived to the meditation field. But if I put on the right track of music, I can really zone out and think, yeah, do whatever it needs to be done to yourself. Yeah, it sounds like a

Unknown 1:01:21
meditation is not about just that type of music. Absolutely. Meditation is all about what it’s a practice that you put together for yourself and it’s whatever works best for you. I’ve tried a lot of things I’ve tried going to the meditation classes and whatnot to try to stress relief. I meditate the best when I’m fishing, and it’s literally because I just zone out like completely clear my mind. That’s what works best for me. So you just go what Yeah, you go What? With what works best for you?

Justin Trosclair 1:01:52
So so I’m not official, official person. What do you What’s the size weight? Do you go by like this is the biggest fish I ever caught or like what what makes you what your brand is?

Unknown 1:02:05
Not much of a Brad point. I like to catch crabs, the you know the blue point crabs and a real popular here. You grew up here right?

Unknown 1:02:13
I did grow up there. Were just making sure the blueprint crabs are by far guys the best

Unknown 1:02:19
wishes delicious. Oh, I’m really good at catching that and and catching shrimp. So fishing. I mean, yeah, I’ll catch redfish. I don’t have any like bragging points on that. But shrimping and catching crabs like I can I can catch 12 doesn’t crabs. Not a problem. Well, some so that a lot.

Unknown 1:02:37
A lot of

Unknown 1:02:39
your limit. Out. One one boat? Yeah. That’s all you sell them a call people. We have a big boil at somebody’s house and 20 people come over and eat them. Louisiana. Yeah.

Justin Trosclair 1:02:55
My goodness. Last couple questions here. Alright, so you mentioned books. Do you have a favorite book or podcast that you secretly love? Second half, one that you would actually recommend for others.

Unknown 1:03:08
Secretly love Oh, we’re airing out the dirty laundry. Let me see. Hold on. Let me look at my stack here. You ready for cheese factor? Here we go. I’ve been on and I mean, this has been an ongoing thing for years and years. But I’ve obviously been on a little bit of a dolly parton cake lately because I got to see her in concert and got to meet her which was an absolute dream come true. Thank you. Thank

Justin Trosclair 1:03:30
you. You know, she just raised like a million dollars for those Tennessee 9 million. Oh, I’m sorry.

Unknown 1:03:38
I told you. This is a good this is a guilty pleasure. No, I am Yeah, cuz I were those fires where we’re not very far from where I went to pharmacy school. So it was it was really I kind of followed a lot of that because a lot of my friends are suffering pretty bad, you know, right now, but uh, anyway, uh, she has, and this is cheese factor, but we’re going to go with it anyway, I want to find

Unknown 1:04:01
she did a commencement speech at the University of Tennessee back in 2007. And

Unknown 1:04:08
it was actually really a great little speech. And the ladies done a lot of stuff. She’s, you know, smart business woman. And, you know, she’s seen and done a lot in her career. So there was a book associated with with that commencement speech, basically, expanding upon it. And it’s, you know, it’s like 120 pages. I ate that up so fast. And it was it was actually quite good at gave a lot of good advice just about making smart decisions. And I don’t know, going for goals and not being afraid, you know, not letting people stop you kind of thing. It’s kind of cheesy and inspirational. But that that’s been she has a classic. Yeah,

Justin Trosclair 1:04:48
she paved the way her like Reba McEntire and all those.

Were the

Unknown 1:04:54
sheep. Actually, she paved the way for Reba who paved the way for others kind of Yeah, absolutely. And dolly, dolly Dolly man. I mean, she she’s built up, she’s worth like, half a billion dollars. I mean, to have that kind of longevity at 70 years old and a career. And to still be that and your theme park. Yeah, I used to go to that theme park. It’s incredible. Yeah, before Superman, but um, you know, she just she, she doesn’t let people stop her. And she makes good decisions, sometimes bad decisions. And she is all about, you know, this is what life is

Unknown 1:05:28
really about. You have to

Unknown 1:05:30
go out there and just put it all out there and try because why not? But um, so yeah, that little books, kind of my guilty pleasure, but kind of a nice little inspirational deal. I’m trying to think of one that I would recommend. I have quite a few. Ah, ok. So when I was in my, I guess, late 20s, I was finishing up pharmacy school. And I saw a TED talk. I really liked TED Talks. I don’t know if you watch or Yeah. Okay. Yes. Or there was one in particular that really struck me. My psychologist, her name is Meg, J, J, a y. And it’s called, think he can, I don’t know if you can see, it’s called the defining decade. And why your 20s matter and how to make the most of them now. So if you’re recommending a book to anyone in their 20s, I highly recommend that book. I mean, she’s a psychologist, she’s got, you know, she’s got, obviously, there’s evidence based medicine type research going into this, this is not just like, Hey, this is what you should do like this, she’s, you know, obviously, has an education well versed. And I really, it really gave me some some good thoughts has been a couple, obviously, a couple years since I read it, but it really pushed me a bit to, to not be afraid to go out there. Because, you know, she talks about, basically, your brain is forming in the latter parts of the the formation of your brain happens in the very end of your 20th. So if you want to make any kind of changes, psychological or, or whatnot, you know, that that that’s the end, so you better make it happen, you know, so just really kind of pushed me to to make some choices.

Justin Trosclair 1:07:13
will put that in the show notes, for sure. Yeah,

Unknown 1:07:16
yeah, I really, I highly recommend that book to anyone in their 20s. And even if not, I mean, it’s just

Justin Trosclair 1:07:22
doesn’t amaze you how much we drink not and I was never a drinker. But in general, people drink a lot in their 20s. And so your brains not even for I know and you start having I didn’t

Unknown 1:07:31
drink a lot a lot. I was in school so much and studied a little too much. I was a little bit of a nerd, so But yeah, absolutely.

Justin Trosclair 1:07:40
That we too. I never understood those doctors who drink so you’re not an undergrad? Yeah.

Unknown 1:07:44
Oh, yeah, we have those two. And I’m like, really? Come on. You’re supposed to be a professional.

Justin Trosclair 1:07:51
We might have lost them some listener.

Unknown 1:07:53
That’s okay. That’s wrong. Well, sorry. I’m a nerd. What can I say?

Justin Trosclair 1:07:58
Last question. Are you ready for this? Uh huh. What is your favorite app? Oh, geez. Assuming your smartphone and in

Unknown 1:08:07
yeah. Oh, yeah. A business or pleasure? What is my favorite app? Let me get my phone and determine that. I mean, my fine. I have some finance apps that I follow that I like, I mean, but that’s, that’s just because I’m obsessed with my business. So that’s lame. You want to be a finance nerd. That’s why I love QuickBooks. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I’ve got QuickBooks on my phone. I’m so

Justin Trosclair 1:08:31
excited to do my end of the year.

Unknown 1:08:33
Uh huh.

Unknown 1:08:35
I mean, I’ve pretty much done all mine. Yeah. Oh, yeah. There’s one that’s called it’s changed his name a couple times, I think. But it’s into it. And it’s a mint MIT. And as it keeps track of like it consolidates your, your credit cards and your bank accounts, and basically says, like, overall, this is how much this is how much money you have, after subtracting, you know, all of your credit card debt and whatnot. And, or don’t have it in there, too. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, that’s kind of nice, because I can take a quick peek, and it’s like, oh, okay, let me check my checking account. And let me check this and it kind of puts everything together, it puts, you know, all of my charges on my credit card, pop up in there. I like that, because I want to make sure that everything is okay, you know,

Justin Trosclair 1:09:27
into it. So it feels like it’s safe. And I mean, I’ve been using that one for a long time. Oh, yeah. Okay, I can’t, I can’t we can’t say that. It’s always safe, and you won’t get hacked or anything. But it’s been good for me. And it’s been very eye opening. Like you said, it’s it’s fun.

Unknown 1:09:41
I like the Experian Credit tracker XP r a n experience. It’s like $25 a month for it, though. I mean, I have it for my business, because I want to make sure that someone doesn’t happen, you know, try to steal my identity, or start buying this. Yeah, yeah. And it’ll, it updates my credit score all the time. And it gives me you know, if something pops up, it’ll alert me. I really like that. Non nerdy wise.

Justin Trosclair 1:10:11
I’m not really smart, though. We’re business owners. And you need to keep track of these things.

Unknown 1:10:17
Oh, yeah. Well, you know, I had at people call a lot and like scam type stuff. And that just scares me. And sometimes they’ll call at work and I’m, you know, or they’ll call your cell phone. You’re like, what is this? And I usually don’t answer him, but one time I answered it. And like, guys are asking me these questions like, what, you know, it just freaked me out. Like, I didn’t answer any of his stuff. But I was so scared that somehow, you know, by me answering the call that he got ahold of, you know, it’s just like, Oh, my God, I have to do something to make sure that, you know, people aren’t stealing my identity, because now I have something to lose. You know, before it was like, Bring it on, you want to pay my debt? Great. Now, it’s like, oh, no. Okay, you know, I need to be good

Justin Trosclair 1:11:03
at the bank one time and ask them a question. And they said, Let me look it up another way. And somebody else had my exact same number. Oh, in Louisiana as well, what? And I was like, so what can we do about this? And so it was a big run around and I ended up nothing happened except for like, two years later. I asked him again, and they were able to take care of it at that point. But yeah, I was starting to get nervous. I was like, Well, what if they, you know, have a credit card in my name and the whole nother city, another state? And now I’m on the hook for something I was like, This is that’s not cool. So that’s, that’s a good app. Right? Yeah.

Unknown 1:11:36
And as far as like, for a fun, like fun one, when I get stressed out, that’s when I start looking at travel. I start like planning trips, that may never happen, because I don’t know, for me at least just kind of playing around with that bring some excitement. So I like the the kayak app, that yes, yeah, I mean, I use that a lot to look for flights, just you know, for fun. So other than that, I don’t really got like Netflix app on here or something.

Justin Trosclair 1:12:04
Who knows, wife, I’ve heard it said, you know, having a trip gives you more excitement, and gives you something to look forward to. So always, even if it’s something as small as, I don’t know, going to Mississippi or something, there’s something to look forward to and it just excites you, and it gets you more motivated. And something I don’t know, just does something to our psyche. That’s really powerful.

Unknown 1:12:23
Well, you know, here’s how I look at it. And I’m sure this probably comes to you to you feel like as a business owner that this is like, this is the rest of my life, like everyday, like we’re just going to do this day. And there’s no into this, you know, like, there’s no like, you know, when you’re in school was like, Oh, I just got to get to the semester to the end of the semester and finals and everything is good. This is like, Oh, god, this is a break. There’s no break ever, you know, so to have like that little like trip set, you know, like, Oh, well, okay, coordinate, you just got to hold out until September and you’re going to be gone for a week. Like, yes, you know, and that that really helps it kind of breaks it up. Because usually when I go on these trips, I just decompress so much. And I’m like, Oh my god, like I feel like a human again. Because sometimes I don’t sometimes I don’t I mean, I’d get pretty stressed out. But anyway,

Justin Trosclair 1:13:16
yeah, it was it was definitely a relief when I sold the clinic and was able to you know, it was just it was time it was time to move on and, and it felt really good that just have that off. But yeah, now it’s like, Okay, I need to get back into it. Right. And that’s, you miss it, which is gone, then you miss it, you know, like, Okay, next time or now? I’m gonna start making that balance. Yeah, so they don’t get burned out. And there’s a continual,

Unknown 1:13:38
continual battle there. You’ll never have balance, you will always strive for it. And that’s all you can do. And that’s okay. Like, once you accept that, like,

Justin Trosclair 1:13:47
yes.

Unknown 1:13:48
Yeah, month cycle, right. No problem. No problem. Yep.

Justin Trosclair 1:13:52
Absolutely. Well, to wrap up here, if you want, how can people find you? Social media, things like that. If you want people to you if you

Unknown 1:14:00
want people to find you. Well, there’s a Facebook fan page for the store. And it’s Courtney’s thrifty way pharmacy. Okay, so you can look me up there. You can find me on Facebook. It’s Courtney Petri. I’m the one with like, the mountains behind me or I don’t even know. But uh, yeah, if people want to find me, or if they want to email me, they can send me an email. We’ll just, I’ll just leave that alone.

Justin Trosclair 1:14:27
I’ve heard bad things about that about

Unknown 1:14:29
email. Oh, okay. Great idea. Don’t email.

Unknown 1:14:35
me. Sure. To you. Sounds good. All right.

Justin Trosclair 1:14:39
Okay. Well, thank you so much. This has been amazing. We just went hashtag behind the curtain. We’re Dr. Courtney, Petri. Thank you so much for being a trooper and waking up so early for this interview. I know I got some good information out of it. And I know you did to what we do now is take what she said implement it into your own practice might take some critical thinking, but you can do it. I know you can. That’s really all I have to say. Stay tuned for the travel tip. Coming up next. I almost forgot I am putting the final touches on a free ebook that I want to give to you guys and gals, please go to a doctor’s perspective. net, top side, the bottom, there’s all kinds of places where you can sign up, put your email and your name for updates. Once the book is complete, I will send you a email and then you can download it. It is going to be my secret hacks about health, weight loss, strengthening the spine, different things like that. It’s very actionable it’s implementable is not only can you use it, but also your patients. So go on over to a doctor’s perspective. NET sign up, and you’ll be the first to know when that ebook is ready for that.

I am quite active on social media and the easiest way to connect is the head over to a doctor’s perspective net. Look at the top right and you will see all the social media icons just pick your flavor and friend me. I found out in practice that people can hardly pronounce trust Claire, much less spell it because of that. And username lack of availability. I have a mix of my name and Cajun Cairo. I’m from South Louisiana, aka Cajun country. I am a Cajun I am a chiropractor, Cajun Cairo. You will find travel photos, updates, fun comments, etc. Connect comment and I’ll respond back

this week’s travel tip let’s say you’re at an airport in the middle of the night. You have a layover maybe five hours you know the first flight out. You can try to go and find a hotel check in then have to wake up in like two hours and get your way back to the airport go through security. Or you can just spend the night in the airport. The way you do it is you are going to sleep on the chairs but usually they have armrest so it’s uncomfortable. So what do you do, you can sleep on the floor Nah, lay on the chairs with your knees on the seat facing the backrest. Then use your arms and you slide them underneath the armrest are between them and use your bag as your pillow and use a strap and buckle it to the armrest so that you know less likely to get stolen. You’re not gonna be sleeping great anyway, but it is definitely an option. Take a little bit more sleep for that early flight out when you just can’t get to a hotel. Hope that helps. It helps for me. We just went hashtag behind the curtain and this episode has come to an end. I hope you got the right dose for your optimal life. Please spread the word about this podcast by telling to friends, share it on social media and visit the show notes on a doctor’s perspective. net to see all the references from today’s guest is sincere thank you in advance. You’ve been listening to Dr. Justin trust Claire giving you a doctor’s perspective.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai